The Great Theft: Wrestling Islam From the Extremists (34 page)

The word used in the Qur’an for God’s favor is
fadl
. This word and its variant forms are used repeatedly throughout the Qur’an to connote a physical or spiritual blessing or prefer- ence granted by God, either as a reward for good deeds or as an act of grace. If one analyzes the well over fifty times that

the Qur’an uses the word
fadl,
one will come to realize that the clear and ascertainable fact that both the reward and the grace of God are accessible to
all
seekers. Consistently, the Qur’an calls upon believers to struggle and strive for the re- ward and grace of God. Once it is realized that God’s reward and grace are accessible to all, and are contingent on the ef- forts of human beings and God’s blessing, this materially af- fects the way we approach the verses cited above. With this understanding, we come to realize that men and women equally qualify for God’s grace and reward. The authority given to men over women is not because they are men but be- cause, in a particular historical context, men financially pro- vided for women. But if the circumstances change, and women share financial responsibility with men, authority must be equally shared between the two as well.

Rather tellingly, many of the rights women achieved in early Islam were in response to demands made by women to the Prophet in Medina. A
basic
set of moral rights was offered to women without there being a social demand for such rights. For instance, the Qur’an strictly forbade the morally offensive practice in pre-Islamic Arabia in which poor families mur- dered their young daughters and offered their souls to the gods, believing that engaging in this sacrificial practice, the gods would send them boys to replace the girls. This was strictly prohibited without regard to social demands because murder is wrong in every condition and situation. However, fi- nancial and property rights, as well as some social rights, were often granted by God after women mobilized into a demand group. This is consistent with the Qur’an’s principle of acces- sibility of reward and grace. The Qur’an consistently empha- sizes that God does not change a people unless they first change themselves.
20
Put simply, the Qur’an sets out moral goals and ethical objectives, but if people want to advance on

the road of morality and beauty, they must change themselves first, and struggle toward acquiring God’s blessings and grace. Another example of a practice that caused suffering and that raised demands for change, and in turn elicited a strong Qur’anic response relates to repeated marriages and divorces done in an abusive way. In pre-Islamic Arabia, a man enjoyed the exclusive right to divorce his wife with or without cause. After the divorce, a woman was compelled to go through something known as the
‘idda
(a specific waiting period before she could marry again), during which a husband could re- marry his divorcée without a new contract or dowry. Many men started using these privileges as a way to torment women—as a way of spite, a man would divorce his wife, wait until a day or two before the
‘idda
period was about to expire, and then remarry his wife again, only to divorce her again immediately so that a new waiting period would begin. This would be done over and over without any limit. This was used as a way of keeping a woman hanging—such a woman would neither be married nor divorced. As long as the hus- band kept taking his divorcée back shortly before the end of the waiting period, the wife would remain in an impossible sit- uation, never being able to remarry as long as her husband kept exercising his option during the waiting period. In one version of this same practice, husbands would add insult to in- jury by proclaiming, one or two days before the end of the waiting period,
“La’ibt”
(“I was just playing, jesting, or fool-

ing around”).

Several women complained to the Prophet about these prac- tices and asked for a solution, and the Prophet asked them to wait until he received revelation on the matter. The Qur’anic response to these practices was manifold, and as is typical of Qur’anic methodology, the Qur’an limited the potential for abuse without fundamentally changing the existing social

structure. Condemning those who divorce and remarry women out of a desire to torment and harass them, the Qur’an ex- claimed that a husband should either live with his wife in kind- ness and honor, or divorce her also in kindness and honor; but in all situations, those who hold on to their wives in order to torment or harass them have committed a great sin and they have become among those who are unjust toward themselves.
21
In addition, while not eradicating the practice of
‘idda,
the Qur’an limited the process to two times. A husband and wife may divorce and return to each other during the waiting pe- riod, but only two times. If there is a third divorce, they cannot remarry during the waiting period.
22
As to those who insulted their wives by telling them they were just jesting, the Qur’an describes such behavior as sinful and responds by saying: “Do not mock the words and decrees of your Lord.”
23
It is interest- ing that mocking a divorced wife is equated in the Qur’anic dis- course with the sin of mocking the words, decrees, and will of the Lord. It is as if this demeaning way of dealing with divorced women is considered directly offensive to God.

The repeated Qur’anic dynamic was to honor the demands of women and empower them to the extent possible within the prevalent sociohistorical context at the time. But I think it is fair to say that whatever particular rights were granted women at one time or another, even without there being a de- mand for change, the Qur’an consistently and systematically condemned conditions that were oppressive and abusive to- ward women. There is a condition in Qur’anic language called
‘istid’af
(abusive and oppressive treatment that renders a per- son powerless). The ethical lesson consistently and systemati- cally taught by the Qur’an is that placing women in oppressive and abusive conditions—
‘istid’af
—is fundamentally at odds with Islamic morality and with the very idea of submission to God. There are numerous examples of this:

In pre-Islamic Arabia, in the seventh century and earlier, one of the prevailing abusive practices was to consider a wife as part of the inheritable legacy of a deceased man. Accord- ingly, a brother would typically inherit his deceased brother’s wife, but he did not inherit the wife as
property
. Rather, the brother would have an option to marry the wife if he so de- sired, and the wife would not be free to marry again until the brother had decided whether or not to exercise his option. The resulting practice was that brothers having the option would refuse to release the wife unless she paid him a sum of money for her freedom, or, if the wife received a marriage proposal, the brother would usurp the dowry in return for granting the wife a release. Of course, this practice created a class of op- pressed and highly dependent women and the Qur’an strictly prohibited the taking of women as hostages. In addition, more generally, the Qur’an forbade the tyrannizing of women in order to usurp their money, and laid out a broad principle that when men live with women, the basis for their cohabitation must be kindness and equanimity.
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Another widespread social practice with an oppressive ef- fect on women involved the taking of the dowry. Normally upon marriage, the groom would pay the bride a dowry, the amount of which she was supposed to decide with input from her family. Fathers, however, got into the habit of taking dowries themselves, without consulting with their daughters. This created a strong potential for abuse because fathers had an incentive to marry their daughters off to the person paying the highest dowry. This practice undermined the very purpose for dowries in Islam, which were supposed to provide women with some form of financial security. In response, the Qur’an ordered men to refrain from usurping women’s dowries and went further by advising men that it is immoral to covet money they have given women (
‘ann tib nafs
), and that it is

also immoral to connive to take back money that was given to women in goodwill.
25
Not surprisingly, considering the prac- tices of the age, the idea that there was to be a distinction be- tween the property of fathers and husbands on the one hand, and daughters and wives on the other, was nothing short of shocking. Nevertheless, the distinction was necessary to ad- dress actual abuses confronting the early Muslim community. Divorce presented a whole separate set of problems. Among the pervasive and highly abusive practices was that upon di- vorcing women, men would seek to take back whatever money or property they had given them during the course of the marriage. In addition, quite often upon divorce, men would make alimony payments or other forms of support con- ditional. If, for whatever reason, men became displeased with the demeanor or conduct of their divorced wives, they would refuse to make any postmarriage payments. The Qur’an em- phasized that it was a serious sin to take money given to wives during the course of a marriage, and it could be done only under a limited and restricted set of conditions.
26
As to al- imony, the Qur’an asserted: “And for divorced women make fair provision—this is a duty upon the God-fearing and pious.”
27
In other words, the Qur’an removed the element of discretion from the hands of men and made a correlation be- tween obedience to God, piety, and submission to God and the removal of the condition of
istid’af
in which these women

found themselves.

In each of these examples, the Qur’an reformed social con- ditions that were oppressive and exploitative toward women. Importantly, in the process of implementing the needed social reforms, the Qur’an also established or promoted broadly ap- plicable moral and ethical principles that transcend any partic- ular context or circumstance. In other words, as the Qur’an solved the social problems that confronted the women living

in Medina at the time of the Prophet, it also affirmed moral and ethical principles that are universal in scope.

I think it is clear that in the modern age it is impossible for any country to develop if half of its population is marginalized and secluded. Women constitute more than half of the Muslim world’s population, and most of the Muslim countries are poor and underdeveloped. In the majority of these impover- ished countries, the labor and active participation of women in public life is a requisite for development. Countries like Saudi Arabia are in a very different situation. Because of their wealth, they can afford to preach the seclusion of women— many households in the oil-rich countries can afford to subsist on single incomes. The point is that the puritans’ positions are not only gender-biased but also class-biased. Most Muslims cannot afford the puritan vision of Islam.

The type of marginalization and seclusion of women advo- cated by puritans today is unprecedented in Islamic history. I focus on the issue of women and provide specific examples from the Qur’an because puritan propaganda, supported by petro-dollars, has managed to make many Muslims forget their own heritage and civilization. In just the few previous exam- ples, it is clear that women played a very active role in the early Medina state of the Prophet. But even more, up to the sixteenth century, Islam had produced thousands of women jurists and scholars, who used to stand in the mosques of Damascus and Cairo and teach hundreds of male jurists. Because Muslims have largely forgotten their own heritage, puritans find it easy to accuse anyone who seeks to recognize women’s rightful place in Muslim society of being a Westernizer.

The fact is that far from being Westernizers, moderates are fully anchored in the theology and jurisprudence of Islam. Their views, in my opinion, are far more anchored in Islamic morality and history than the puritans’ reactive and often

vindictive attitudes toward women. The difference between moderates and puritans often comes down to an issue of re- spect toward women as dignified and autonomous beings. For example, all puritans agree that regardless of a woman’s con- victions, the state should compel
and coerce all
women to wear the veil. Moderates disagree amongst themselves on whether the veil is Islamically mandated or whether it is a religious duty upon women, but all moderates agree that in all cases it should be a woman’s autonomous decision whether to wear the veil or not, and that her choice must be respected. The moderates’ pro-choice position is based on the Qur’anic teaching that there ought to be no compulsion in religion.

CONCLUSION

R

eligions, like all strong convictions, are a powerful force—they have the ability to thrust people toward an abyss of hate or carry them to unprecedented heights of love and enlightenment. This force is a potential that exists in all of what represents a religion: its texts and history, its creed and mythology, its rituals and symbols. What comes out of this po- tential depends on those who are able to give effect to the force of religion on earth. While a religion is owned, at least in theory, by a deity, the reality is that unless that deity is present here on earth, managing and regulating how the potential is used, it is left to those who describe themselves as the follow- ers of that religion to exploit the potential in any particular way. The question, once that potential is used, is: Who bears the responsibility—on whom do we place the responsibility

for what has been done in the name of this religion?

The answer to this question is actually much harder than some might realize. But the response is also what explains so many of the differences between the puritans and the moder- ates of Islam. How would the puritans answer this question? I think that the puritans would think that it is the wrong ques- tion—how can one differentiate between a religion and the re- sponsibility for it? Puritans would say religion is not represented by anything other than its texts and rituals, and the sincere follower would read the text and do the rituals.